Paul Jannace: No redemption in sight for Dwight Gooden

Paul Jannace

Wednesday

Mar 31, 2010 at 12:01 AM

There’s a fine line between a tragic story and a sad one. Dwight Gooden’s is very, very sad. A tragic story should have room for sympathy. With Gooden, the fear is he hasn’t even hit rock bottom yet and is losing any chance at sympathy and redemption.

There’s a fine line between a tragic story and a sad one. Dwight Gooden’s is very, very sad.

A tragic story should have room for sympathy. With Gooden, the fear is he hasn’t even hit rock bottom yet and is losing any chance at sympathy and redemption.

The story of the strikeout artist formerly known as “Dr. K” is filled with “what ifs” of a career that should be celebrated, instead of disappointment over what could have been.

Gooden’s latest brush with the law came last week when he was involved in a two-vehicle accident with a child in the car. The worst part, however, is that Gooden got arrested for driving under the influence of drugs, leaving the scene of an accident, as well as child endangerment and other traffic violations.

This from a man who has had several battles with alcoholism, drug abuse, been in and out of rehab clinics and even did time in prison.

It’s a long way from his days as a flame-throwing phenom for the New York Mets in the mid-1980s. That’s what makes his story so difficult to tell and recall.

This is a man who should be remembered for being one of the most dominant pitchers of all time for a team that should have won more than one World Series championship during that era. Instead, he’s the former Mets’ pitcher who did drugs with Darryl Strawberry.

Strawberry’s story also is littered with tales of wasted talent and “what could have been,” but so far — knock on wood — he’s been able to get himself straightened out. Like Gooden, Strawberry, 48, also went to jail and kept falling further and further, but unlike his buddy, “Straw” has seemingly learned his lesson.

Gooden, 45, Strawberry were on a collison course with Cooperstown with a Mets team ready to explode. Strawberry won the NL?Rookie of the Year in 1983, followed by Gooden’s historic 1984 rookie season and legendary 1985 campaign.

Adding Keith Hernandez, Gary Carter, and a few other key spare parts, and the 1986 New York Mets were born. Steam-rolling through the regular season, the Mets played a classic NLCS against the Houston Astros and one of the most memorable World Series ever against the Boston Red Sox.

With Strawberry and Gooden just entering their primes, there should have been more trips down the Canyon of Heroes. Not an endless line of arrests and a far-too-quick fall from grace for the Mets.

They came close in the years following, but nothing was the same for that team, and it wasn’t all on Gooden and Strawberry. That was a roster full of boozing, skirt-chasing bozos that were great at what they did — on and off the field — and that actually ended up being their downfall.

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Whether you are a Mets fan or not, a must-read is Jeff Pearlman’s “The Bad Guys Won,” which chronicles that entire 1986 season and sets up what was about to happen to that group. Myself, I’ve read it cover-to-cover twice and have thought about picking it up again.

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It’ll be tough to find a professional athlete more underappreciated than Donovan McNabb has been in Philadelphia. He’s been a five-time Pro Bowler, has led the Eagles to five NFC?titles games and a Super Bowl. While he’s failed to deliver the big prize, he has taken far too much of the blame despite a very productive NFL?career. He’s certainly not above criticism, but to be booed, beaten, and bashed the way he has during his career is ridiculous.

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The Pittsburgh Steelers may have a crucial decision to make very soon. With both Ben Roethlisberger and Santonio Holmes facing lawsuits, the team has to tread lightly with how they handle the future of their star players. Neither has been charged with a crime, which probably makes their current state all the more difficult. The team and the league is stuck, waiting for the legal process to take its course and see if these accusations are legitimate or false. There’s nothing they can do right now, as far as disciplining the players until they know what truly happened.

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That being said, for both Holmes and Roethlisberger, it’s not the first accusation for either, and you hate to think the worst, but at the very least, their decision-making has to be brought into question.

Paul Jannace writes for the Daily Reporter in Wellsville, N.Y.

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